Ted Rall for December 16, 2002
Transcript:
Years of advertising have conditioned the American brain to pay attention only to repeated messages. As a result no news story is remembered until you see or hear about it at least 24 times. (Man: Yeah, hi. I'd like to refinance my mortgage.) Thus the government doesn't feel the need to censor news that makes it look bad. (Man 2: U.S. troops buried thousands of Iraqis alive during the first Gulfwar.) (Man 3: Release it late Friday so it runs Saturday.) Instead, potentially controversial news is released once, never to be discussed again. (Television: The Dow Jones industrial average is down again we buried Iraqis alive during the '91 Gulf War "The Simpsons" is on at 6 the U.N. isn't going -anything to North-) People who miss the news that day doubt that it ever happened. (Man 1: Unbelievable!) (Man 4: Funny, I never heard of that.) Soon, even those who know the truth begins to doubt their own memories. (Man 1: Back in 90something, in Iran-er... maybe I should refianance.)